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On a parcel of Berkshire commuter belt surrounded via tall partitions, impenetrable hedges and locked safety gates, a neighborhood businessman is development his dream house. And cash seems to be no object.
The mission comes to no longer one, however two present McMansions, plus a few fields and a small space of forest. They are being amalgamated into an unlimited home mega-compound.
A small military of contractors has spent months development state of the art extensions, laying turf and putting in statues and fountains. When completed, their advent will duvet more or less ten acres of inexperienced belt, a stone’s throw from Royal Ascot.
‘It’s like one thing out of a Bond film,’ reviews one neighbour. ‘They’re operating round-the-clock. Sometimes even the use of floodlights after darkish. The price will have to be astronomical. Millions. Tens of hundreds of thousands. Who is aware of?’
The guy orchestrating this enterprise seems to be a 56-year-old entrepreneur named Sarwar Khawaja.
The director of a few 15 lively firms, which function in large part in actual property and schooling, he is probably not a family identify. But no longer for need of attempting.
In September, for instance, Khawaja, or somebody with regards to him, paid the Independent newspaper’s schooling segment to jot down a work of ‘sponsored content’ about his lifestyles and occasions.
Headlined ‘Sarwar Khawaja’s imaginative and prescient: empowering via schooling’, the 500-word hagiography dubbed him a ‘pioneering force’ able to ‘visionary leadership’ whose ‘career is a testament to his relentless drive to push the boundaries of what is possible’.
On social media, the self-styled ‘professor, philanthropist and visionary’ loves to submit pictures of himself glad-handing such celebrities as His Majesty the King
Sarwar Khawaja is director of a few 15 lively firms, which function in large part in actual property and schooling
On social media, the self-styled ‘professor, philanthropist and visionary’ loves to submit pictures of himself glad-handing such celebrities as His Majesty the King, former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and the shoe dressmaker Jimmy Choo.
He’s additionally spent years flaunting the trimmings of luck on-line, from his chunky wristwatches and sharp fits to a Rolls-Royce bearing the number-plate SK7.
Yet simply over two months in the past, the tub-thumping stopped.
A private web page, which had dubbed him a ‘distinguished British educationalist, entrepreneur, thought leader, venture capitalist and educational philanthropist’, used to be taken down. An Instagram feed claiming he used to be ‘fun to be around’ and preferred ‘promoting coexistence and diversity’ used to be set to non-public.
His profile on X vanished, and a RelatedIn account touting him as knowledgeable in ‘leadership, education and AI technologies’ used to be subjected to intensive enhancing.
The bout of shyness got here at a captivating time for Sarwar Khawaja. For it coincided with a maximum unlucky flip of occasions at a trade with regards to his center.
Specifically, he used to be (to cite that ‘sponsored’ Independent content material) ‘at the helm’ of an academic status quo named Oxford Business College (OBC). It have been ‘under his leadership’ since 2018.
Various articles, some wearing his byline, referred to as him its ‘Chairman of Business Development’, ‘Chairman of the Strategic Board’ and ‘Executive Board Chairman’.
Specifically, Khawaja used to be (to cite that ‘sponsored’ Independent content material) ‘at the helm’ of an academic status quo named Oxford Business College (pictured)
For years, the hyperlink to OBC have been one thing Khawaja boasted about. In reality, his identify used to be actually above the door of its franchised campus development in Nottingham (extra of which later), in 4ft-long letters.
It sits underneath the citation ‘It’s no longer the place you come back from, it’s the place you select to head’.
Eight months in the past, OBC’s head of scholar products and services Noaman Islam shared a picture of this signal, applauding ‘beautiful words by Professor Sarwar Khawaja, our exceptional leader and beacon of inspiration’.
But in overdue March, the whole lot modified. For Oxford Business College used to be centre-stage in a exceptional political scandal. One that became this establishment underneath Khawaja’s ‘leadership’ into an emblem of virtually the whole lot this is flawed with Britain’s ill upper schooling device.
It started with an editorial within the Sunday Times newspaper which recognized OBC as a hotbed of student-loan fraud.
Hundreds of its scholars have been, the object claimed, dishonestly enrolling on ‘franchised’ level lessons there regardless of having no purpose of doing any precise learning. Instead, they sought after simply to get right of entry to profitable loans.
Such scams are taking place around the upper schooling sector, leaving British taxpayers at the hook for loads of hundreds of thousands – and possibly billions – of kilos. A contemporary Government probe, which simply scratched the outside of the issue, traced a minimum of 1,785 fraudulent investment packages to simply six faculties since 2022, costing taxpayers £22million.
Its authors reckoned a minimum of 270 scholars at OBC have been concerned, claiming £4million, however mentioned the true price could also be some distance upper.
Oxford Business College is co-owned via its director, Padmesh Gupta (pictured)
Mr Gupta owns the company at the side of a get dressed dressmaker named Titiksha Shah (pictured)
Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, used to be outraged. In April, she made an exceptional observation to Parliament, pronouncing that Oxford Business College’s 10,000 present scholars have been to be banned from receiving any scholar loans in any respect.
It highlighted ‘credible concerns’ about ‘recruitment and attendance’ on the establishment, pronouncing the Government’s Internal Audit Agency feared it used to be recruiting scholars whose ‘competence in the English language’ used to be insufficient after which wasn’t tracking whether or not they to wait elegance.
OBC used to be mightily disenchanted, pronouncing the probe had concluded with out discovering proof of fraud, illegality or malfeasance.
It referred to as the transfer ‘a wholly unjustified action which threatens the future of the college and our students’, including it ‘firmly believes that the DfE’s determination is against the law and has lodged an pressing software for judicial evaluation’.
Days later, I visited Oxford Business College. There I found out one thing actually atypical: the establishment that Khawaja had ‘under his leadership’ used to be what scholars of Russian propaganda may name a Potemkin college.
While the development’s web page used to be full of pictures of dreaming spires and undergraduates bicycling down cobbled streets or rowing alongside the River Cherwell, its precise headquarters became out to be at the higher flooring of a filthy Royal Mail sorting administrative center close to the teach station.
Despite in principle being house to hundreds of scholars, where used to be nearly totally empty, except a few burly Eastern Europeans smoking out of doors.
This bizarre situation might discuss to the atypical however deeply relating to nature of scholar mortgage fraud, which revolves round the truth that any individual with ‘settled status’ in the United Kingdom can fund college research by way of give a boost to from the state-owned Student Loan Company (SLC).
Bridget Phillipson, the Education Secretary, (pictured) made an exceptional observation to Parliament in April, pronouncing that Oxford Business College’s 10,000 present scholars have been to be banned from receiving any scholar loans in any respect
A sum of as much as £9,535, protecting their annual tuition charges, is then paid at once to the status quo they attend. Up to £13,348 a yr extra is then passed out as a ‘maintenance loan’, which matches at once into the scholar’s private checking account in 3 tranches.
In principle, this money handout is a mortgage. But it begins to be repaid simplest when recipients are incomes over £25,000 a yr. Should they by no means succeed in that threshold, it is going to be written off after 4 a long time.
What’s extra, if the ‘student’ makes a decision to transport out of the country, their debt turns into tough, if no longer inconceivable, to name in.
To put issues in a different way, the device creates a perverse incentive for unscrupulous other people to enrol on lessons and gather loans, whilst having no purpose of attending elegance. Many as an alternative lift on operating in full-time low-wage jobs. The rip-off turns out in particular widespread amongst Eastern European immigrants. Last yr 85,000 Romanian nationals with settled standing in Britain – about 15 in keeping with cent of the total inhabitants – won scholar loans.
While some could have been authentic scholars, many weren’t. Little surprise that Britain’s scholar debt pile is mounting unexpectedly, with taxpayers because of be at the hook for £500billion via 2040.
Aside from the scammers, the individuals who benefit from this scandal are the establishments they attend. For annually a phoney scholar is at the books, they gather £9,535 in rate source of revenue. While some establishments would possibly not know when scholars have cheating intentions, others are accused of no longer doing sufficient to prevent it.
And in excessive circumstances, unscrupulous non-public schooling suppliers (steadily working ‘franchised’ lessons on behalf of correct universities) automatically be offering puts to people who find themselves completely unqualified – in some circumstances slightly in a position to talk English.
The worst then don’t hassle to watch whether or not they attend elegance, do any educational paintings or are even within the nation.
A contemporary Government probe, which simply scratched the outside of the issue, traced a minimum of 1,785 fraudulent investment packages to simply six faculties since 2022, costing taxpayers £22million (inventory symbol)
Questions started to be requested about Oxford Business College in 2023 when a hair-raising New York Times article accused it of sending brokers round immigrant neighbourhoods in Britain, ‘knocking on doors or stopping people in shopping malls’, so that you could recruit scholars.
The file instructed how personnel have been then harassed to just accept candidates who may slightly spell directly to lessons. It used to be all about ‘money, money, money,’ Stefan Lespizanu, a former recruiter for OBC, instructed the paper.
More not too long ago, in step with the Sunday Times, the school has authorized packages for individuals who spoke English as a 2d language, supplied they handed a take a look at at the cell phone app Duolingo.
What makes the scandal at OBC particularly unpleasant is that it sort of feels to were well known about within the upper schooling business. Yet treasured little used to be completed to deliver the issue to the eye of the government till the Press started to file on it.
I will disclose that during November, Buckinghamshire New University, which ran level programmes with OBC by way of a profitable ‘franchise’ scheme, changed into so interested in mortgage fraud there that it employed a expert named Julie Kelly to hold out a proper evaluation.
A replica of her 22-page file, leaked to the Mail, chronicles a number of stunning flaws. ‘Systemic failures in the registry processes’ intended fraudulent packages have been rife, and other people already operating 40-hour-a-week jobs have been automatically allowed to enrol, elevating ‘concerns that they may not be genuine students’.
Kelly discovered many undergraduates sending emails with ‘a time stamp which would indicate that the student is outside of the UK’ and added that 250 ‘academic misconduct’ circumstances hadn’t been adjudicated, a state of affairs that used to be ‘indefensible should the students formally complain or escalate to the Office of the Independent Adjudicator’.
What’s extra, the guide discovered, moderate attendance used to be beneath 50 in keeping with cent. And some scholars who hadn’t attended a unmarried elegance for over a yr have been nonetheless being allowed to get right of entry to loans, which, she concluded used to be ‘a major institutional risk as it breaches SLC funding rules’.
Buckinghamshire New University (BNU) used to be given those detailed findings in November. But it then took the, on reflection, disgraceful determination to not percentage them with the Department for Education, the Office for Students or the Student Loans Company.
In November, Buckinghamshire New University (pictured), which ran level programmes with OBC by way of a profitable ‘franchise’ scheme, changed into so interested in mortgage fraud there that it employed a expert named Julie Kelly to hold out a proper evaluation.
Asked why, a BNU spokesperson this week mentioned the verdict used to be taken via a trio of senior personnel contributors, pointing out ‘all have since left the university’s employment and we’re not able to remark about any selections they took in regards to the sharing of Julie Kelly’s file’. However ‘we will now share the report with the Office For Students retrospectively’.
In different phrases, BNU is in spite of everything going to do one thing, now the shambles has been uncovered via the Mail.
Meanwhile, inside of Oxford Business College, a minimum of one senior member of personnel used to be additionally smartly acutely aware of dodgy scholar loans.
Take Dr Julie King, the previous Dean of OBC’s Nottingham campus. I will disclose that she emailed colleagues in February complaining of woeful attendance there, which have been ‘no more than 50 per cent’. She wrote: ‘I firmly believe this is due to many students not being in the country, consistently not attending, yet drawing their student finance.’
After Bridget Phillipson’s observation to Parliament in April, Dr King resigned from her activity, writing to colleagues: ‘I was shocked to hear of the Secretary of State’s letter to OBC, necessarily last the College. We all know the explanations for this, how some other people, nonetheless a part of OBC, unscrupulously recruited poor-quality scholars whom we’ve got struggled to interact and educate.’
Dr King didn’t reply when requested whether or not she drew the eye of regulators to this scandal. However she has got rid of her time at OBC from her on-line CV on RelatedIn, in an obvious effort to expunge it from the file.
That additionally turns out to were the strategy pursued via the businessman who used to be ‘at its helm’, the aforementioned Sarwar Khawaja. Recent months have introduced efforts to delete more than a few hyperlinks to the disgraced establishment from the web.
Sadly for him, alternatively, a paper path stays. For Khawaja’s connection to OBC dates again to 2018, across the time it all started providing ‘franchised’ levels with Buckinghamshire and a number of other different universities.
This brought about it to increase with astonishing pace, rising from 28 to 265 staff in 5 years, and opening campuses in towns and cities, together with Slough and Nottingham, catering for as many as 10,000 scholars.
After Bridget Phillipson’s observation to Parliament in April, Dr King resigned from her activity
Disclosures to Companies House display that the strategy is massively successful. At the top of 2020, the school’s turnover used to be £5million a yr. This rose to £18million the next yr and £40million the only after. Last yr, it became over £49.7million with income up from £7.1million to £9.5million. The trade used to be then sitting on a money pile of a few £20million.
Yet thriller surrounds the place all that cash finally ends up. Oxford Business College has two ‘ultimate controlling parties’ who’ve been round for many years. They are its govt director, Padmesh Gupta, and (slightly oddly) a get dressed dressmaker named Titiksha Shah. However, the duo percentage an annual dividend of simplest £200,000. The destiny of the remainder of the money is unclear.
Which brings us again to Khawaja and his trade empire. And specifically an organization that he owns and chairs named SK Hub, which claims to be ‘redefining the future by combining purpose and innovation across diverse industries’.
Khawaja seems to be the owner of a minimum of two structures the place Oxford Business College operates. One, the Nottingham Training and Enterprise Centre, is its campus within the town. Another, SK’s head administrative center, the Atrium in Uxbridge, west London, used to be till March the registered deal with of a subsidiary, Oxford Business College UK Limited. SK Hub used to be remaining yr described as ‘a dynamic parent company of the college’ at the programme of OBC’s annual convention remaining yr – despite the fact that an OBC supply instructed me that used to be a ‘mistake’ and will have to have mentioned ‘partner’.
Meanwhile, SK Hub’s YouTube channel is composed nearly totally of promotional movies for the school.
In different phrases, the 2 organisations appear intently intertwined. Yet each SK Hub and Mr Khawaja have deleted all connection with the disgraced College from their web pages and social media feeds because the scandal broke previous this yr.
When I requested for explanation of the character of the connection, an OBC supply described SK Hub as ‘a supplier which provided business consultancy services such as IT solutions to OBC as well as being the landlord of premises in Nottingham’, despite the fact that technically the ones premises appear to be registered to any other considered one of his firms which is primarily based in SK Hub’s administrative center.
All very complicated, despite the fact that we will have to pressure that there’s no proof to signify that SK Hub, Khawaja or certainly OBC’s administrators or controlling events knew about or inspired fraudulent scholar mortgage packages.
Slightly tougher to airbrush from historical past, alternatively, are more than a few articles Khawaja wrote in educational journals.
For instance, in a find out about of ‘deviant workplace behaviour’ printed in a magazine named Business Systems Research previous this yr, the ‘about the author’ segment hails him as ‘a British educationist, thought leader, sociopreneur [sic] and philanthropist’.
To give a boost to this declare, Khawaja says he’s ‘the chairman and CEO of Ealing College Upper School,’ an establishment that hasn’t existed since 2013, in step with the Department for Education, and ‘Chairman of Oxford Education Group’, a company which seems to have one worker, running out of a carrier deal with in Harrow, registers nearly no monetary job and whose web page is lately defunct.
He additionally claims to be a bestselling author who ‘has co-authored a critically acclaimed book The Teacher along with the bestselling author, Nobel Prize nominee and the inventor of mind-mapping Tony Buzan. The Teacher was released worldwide and is being translated into several languages.’
That is unfaithful: no such guide has ever been printed, nonetheless much less launched international, in step with Mr Buzan’s property.
Quite why somebody who claims to be a ‘distinguished educationalist’ will have to put his identify to an educational magazine article peddling such nonsense is any individual’s bet: inquiries in this entrance to each Khawaja and SK Hub, at the side of OBC, went unanswered.
The mysterious entrepreneur ‘at the helm’ of disgraced Oxford Business College is, without doubt, a a hit guy. But in the back of his ‘visionary leadership’ there’s a lot that doesn’t upload up.
